58: Chapter 58 Alice's Experiment

Alice set up a compounding room deep within the Medical Station.

She hadn't applied to him for funding or approval. She had converted an existing storage room in the Medical Station—dismantling old, broken wooden shelves and re-nailing them into a workbench, making a few simple test tube racks from scraps from the Arsenal, and building a small steam sterilizer in the corner. Lin Mo discovered this compounding room during an inspection and saw the test tubes with pale gold labels on the shelves. He picked one up and looked at it, asking no questions, only saying before he left: "Tell me if you're short on any materials."

He saw the test tubes with pale gold labels on the shelves. He picked one up and looked at it, asking no questions—only saying before he left: "Tell me if you're short on any materials."

What Alice was doing in that small compounding room was neither a grand nor a trivial matter. She was trying to isolate trace active ingredients from the tube of emperors gene repair fluid found in the underground shelter—not for mass production, but to analyze its basic structure. It took her several days to find the right ratio of isolating agents, and another few days to confirm that the isolated samples would not rapidly lose their activity after contact with ordinary air. When she finally placed the first tube of isolated sample under the microscope, the cellular structure she saw made her put down her tools and sit down.

It wasn't for mass production, but to analyze its basic structure. This compounding room, converted from a storage room, became Blackstone Town's most secret research outpost.

The level of cellular activity she saw should not have appeared in any known Imperial medical records. Its survival time at room temperature, its rate of division, its ability to adapt to the environment—every piece of data pointed to the same conclusion: the development level of this substance far exceeded the Empire's current medical technology level. That tube of golden-red liquid was not made by the Empire's Star Whisperers Court. It was something much older. Alice wrote a line in her experimental logbook and then closed it. She didn't tell anyone about this line.

[Uncertain.] Lin Mo didn't look back, [But moving forward is better than waiting for death.]

Alice locked the door of the compounding room and placed the isolated sample in the refrigerator deep within the Medical Station. She wrote her final analytical conclusions in her experimental logbook—then turned to the next page and began writing a new experimental plan. It was about how to utilize the properties of that golden-red liquid without exposing its source. She knew—the direction of the first step was now clear.

A pale gold label was stuck on an inconspicuous tube of reagent,

like a small, silent medal.

Only Alice knew about her compounding room during the first week. She had converted a storage room into a crude laboratory—wooden shelves, test tube racks, and a steam sterilizer; every item was pieced together from existing medical supplies. When she worked in that small room, people outside could only hear the faint clinking of glass and the sound of steam venting. Lin Mo once stopped for a few seconds while passing by. He didn't knock, but the next day he had Old Tom deliver an extra set of spare test tube racks to the Medical Station. Old Tom didn't ask why—he was only responsible for the work, while Lin Mo was responsible for the decisions.

When Alice saw the new test tube rack, her fingers paused on the edge of the wooden shelf, then she continued compounding reagents without saying a word. But she placed the new test tube rack in the most useful spot on the workbench—the side near the window with the best light.

On the third day of its operation, the compounding room welcomed its first "visitor"—not a patient, but a gray rat that had squeezed through the vent from somewhere. It sniffed around the shelves, knocked over a tube of distilled water, and then ran off. When Alice chased it into the compounding room, she saw the overturned test tube and a small puddle of water on the floor. She knelt down, picked up the test tube, confirmed it wasn't damaged, and then continued with her work. Her expression didn't change—but when she locked the door and left, she blocked the gap in the vent with a piece of sheet metal.

Lin Mo noticed the newly blocked sheet metal when he passed the Medical Station the next day. He didn't ask. But he knew—Alice's experiments had entered a stage where they could not be disturbed. This wasn't bad news. It meant that what she was doing was getting closer and closer to a result.

The sounds from the compounding room late at night caught the attention of the duty nurse at the Medical Station. She knocked and asked Alice if she needed help; Alice said she didn't. The next morning, the duty nurse saw some water stains leaking from under the door of the storage room turned compounding room—she had worked through the entire night. The nurse left a pot of hot water and a stack of dry rations at the door. At noon, when Alice came out to drink water and saw the pot, she picked it up and took a sip, looking up at the door—no one was there. But she finished the cup of water.

[Three days following the map.]

The experimental logbook on the desk turned to a new page. The notes were more concise than before, yet the handwriting remained clearly legible—every piece of analytical data noted the conditions and results so that another set of experiments could precisely replicate them in the future.

The lights at the Medical Station were always the last to go out in Blackstone Town. Lin Mo would sometimes pass by late at night and see the figure working with head bowed, silhouetted against the oiled paper window. He never went inside to disturb her—but he would slow his pace, confirm the light was still on, and then continue back to the Intelligence Center. He didn't know if Alice noticed those footsteps slowing outside the window. But he knew that if one day that light went out, he would stand before the window for a long time. This thought made his heart tighten—before he could distinguish what that emotion was, his footsteps had already carried him past the Medical Station window and into the door of the Intelligence Center.

—Alice's personal notes after the first isolation experiment

When Alice stepped out of the compounding room to get some fresh air during a break in her experiments, she ran into Lin Mo. He was standing on the steps at the entrance of the Medical Station, looking at the distant flag swaying slightly in the night breeze. Neither spoke; they just stood side by side for a while.

The night breeze blew from the north, carrying the scent of sulfur and metal. The sound of the forging hammers from the distant Arsenal echoed through the night sky, one beat at a time. Alice's silver-white long hair was blown onto Lin Mo's shoulder—she didn't notice, or perhaps she did but didn't move.

Lin Mo didn't move either.

They stood like that for about half a minute. Then Alice said, "The wind tonight is warmer than yesterday." She was talking about the wind, but there was a softness in her voice that didn't belong to the topic of weather.

Lin Mo glanced at her and said, "Maybe spring is coming soon."

Alice gave a soft "mm," turned, and walked back to the compounding room. Lin Mo stood there for a while longer, looking at the flag, before walking back to the Intelligence Center. What he didn't know was that after Alice closed the door to the compounding room, she stood leaning against it for a long time. Her hand was pressed against her chest, and the skin beneath the suppression ring felt slightly hot.

That half-minute standing at the entrance of the Medical Station that night became a fragment Lin Mo would later recall repeatedly. It wasn't because anything earth-shattering had happened during those thirty seconds—on the contrary, nothing happened. Just the wind, the flag, and one person's hair resting on another's shoulder. But it was precisely those thirty seconds where nothing happened that made him realize something he had been avoiding—the distance between him and Alice was shortening in a way he hadn't even noticed. It wasn't because they were actively drawing closer—it was because on this planet where they only had each other, the two had walked in the same direction for so long that they naturally came to stand side by side. He pushed the thought down. Not now, he told himself. But the boundary between "now" and "later" was no longer as clear as he had thought.

After operating for about two months, Alice's compounding room finally produced its first valuable result: a "low-end version of emperors gene repair fluid" that could be mass-produced using ordinary medical equipment.

Of course, the gap between the "low-end version" and the true emperors gene repair fluid was like the gap between a candle and the sun. But a candle is still light. Under the effect of the low-end version fluid, a patient with a spinal injury previously considered "impossible to recover" was able to move their toes in the third week.

After the news spread, people who were not from the town began to appear at the entrance of Blackstone Town's Medical Station. They came from surrounding settlements, and even from places a day's journey away. Some were carried on stretchers, some supported relatives who could not walk, and some dragged a crippled leg themselves.

Alice found Lin Mo on the third day. "I need more space," she said. "The compounding room isn't big enough, and the current number of beds in the Medical Station isn't sufficient."

Lin Mo made arrangements that same day: an unused building next to the Town Hall was allocated to the Medical Station for expansion. Old Tom took a week to complete the renovation—adding twelve new beds, a larger compounding room, and an outpatient area that could accommodate twenty people for treatment simultaneously.

On the day the expansion was completed, Alice paused as she walked through the doors of the new Medical Station. She stood at the entrance, looking at the twelve empty beds, and didn't move for a long time.

Lin Mo stood behind her without speaking. But he knew what she was thinking: these beds would soon be full. In that universe, there would never be a shortage of people in need of healing.

"You will fill them all," he said softly.

Alice didn't look back. But she gave a slight nod.

[In life, we rarely meet, moving like the stars Shen and Shang.]

—Du Fu, "To Wei Ba, a Retired Official." Memory fragments sealed within the mirror of the emperor quietly surfaced in the darkness.

While organizing the battle reports, Lin Mo discovered a number he had overlooked for a long time—there was an unusual spike in the population growth curve of Blackstone Town in a recent month. The extra people had names in the register, but no one remembered seeing them.